106 posts in this topic

Being a 14-year-old member myself, I don't know what weight my opinion has in this thread.

I have to agree that age does NOT equal maturity, as has been stated and proven several times in this thread.

And yes, because I am so young, new, fresh, I have found it incredibly easy to work towards these ideals (but I am nowhere near being able to promote myself to follow PLUR - I don't think it is in most people's natures at my age, and I know I have a lot of work to do before I can go around yelling that at the top of my lungs.) I have taken things closely to heart, for example, the Saving Texas thread, where Sparrow's wife lost her baby.

OK, and I just have to stop here --

and I don't care about people who lose unborn babies during battling.. Shouldn't be battling while your pregnant.. Duh? That's common freakin sense.

I'd just like to say, this guy is so incredibly wrong and misinformed - Sparrow was NOT battling, and he was not the one who was pregnant, but instead he was called a biter and had his child killed by an angry battler who did not adhere to the PLUR ideal. So get your fucking facts straight before you start mouthing off about how you don't care about shit.

Anyway, yeah, because I am so new, I find myself having little trouble with the ideals here at GS.c, and I agree that that is the case with people my age who are not already corrupted. So, as a member of GS.c, how do I feel about younger members? I feel that if they are good people, these individuals, they can indeed be the future to the culture (as it is already obvious that the future of the world relies on the following generation) if they are taught well and keep open minds.

Sadly, it all depends on the individual, though.

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Woobzy had my respect for a while there... I agreed with him on the counts that "battling" is a constructive way to learn. But when pride and a large ego enter the battle, people get mad, and poison peoples wives and kill their children.

When woobzy said his "DUH" statement, he lost it... (not like my respect is worth much to begin with...)

I understand that this is GSC and GSC is defined by a rigid set of beliefs that are set in stone created by the most artful and culturally exposed members of the raving community for the sole purpose of encouraging growth of a positive image towards "the glow sticking crowd".

Understood, simple enough. But should it not be stated that there in no other place to go? And that we as individuals with similar yet deviate beliefs are not strong enough in our numbers to create our own community? And if we were large enough, by creating our own sub-communities we drive stakes between the culture bonds inciting the growth of cancerous splinter groups? And that these splinter groups are a direct step in the opposite direction of unity, causing hate, the detriment of respect, and ultimately disrupting peace?

The 'This is GSC, like it or leave it.' attitude towards incoming members is a major inhibition towards the cultural spread of GSC. I understand that this is essentially a shaping tool to spread only the ideal parts of this newfound society, but the nazidom of views and narrow path we must follow to stay here is a major turn off. (understood that is my choice to follow)

Now I PRAY I wont be banned/suspended/warned for anything I have said, but I need to say one last thing.

I do intend to start a glowsticking club at the college I will be attending in the Fall, I wish to spread the culture as Dave has done here, yet if I am to spread the "correct" views, we should be taught them, not shunned for not knowing them.

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thank you again!! they have all been a blast!!! we were trying to hold a big like tri-state meetup but it wasn't working out too well with everyone's conflicting schedules. we're gonna try again, I believe.

I think checking out other local GSC scenes would be a really enlightening thing, I'm planning on doin that when I get my license this summer! Not to mention, if you have one or two people from a few states away attending one of your local meetups, it would be like having a special guest!! haha. But, if you ever have the time and gas money, I completely embrace you into our NOVA circle of glowstickers, it would be wonderful having you at one, or many of our meetups.

why thank you for the welcome, i appreciate it, and should i find the time and money i will take it upon myself to visit you guys for sure!! and the offer is also extended to you as well on my behalf!! it would be an honor!

to KESSIBUS AND SYSTEMIK, you guys have strong posts and i took something from both, to systemik specifically i understand what you mean about the new member "in your face" approach but ultimatly before i knew anything about the real gs.c culture i had been a newb for a while just occaisionally scouting the forums, i don't believe that new members recieve this type of treatment unless they really go looking for conflict, even then they never took the time to even see what values this website was based on in the first place or even what has happened to try and protect these values.

it is all voluntary in what you do here to make your own experience for yourself, the more you put in i believe the more you will get out of this website, if you are here to contradict everything the site stands for or even disagree with its biggest stance which is battling then this simply is not the best alternative for them.

i don't know how many times i have seen veteran posters repeat themselves on the issue (and they should not have had to, people should have taken the time to read it on there own) as to where you think those people might take into account and listen but ultimatly choose not to and there fate meets them quickly. what you have said is pretty much what it all boils down to, so being up front to some people right away is what has to be a done to preserve what is right and what gs.c holds dearly. i do not believe though that new members have that "in your face, this is how its going to be" experience most of the time, for me it was quite the opposite, i think it may seem that way, but remember that each person has to be handled on an individual basis and treated appropriatly. i wish you the best of luck on starting your club and hope it works out for the best. as for the overall answer to your post i say that new members should read the articles and posts and ask around, they should know the values about the culture and strive to help keep them and all of this should be voluntary on their part to seek out knowledge. it isn't enough to want to know how to string or freehand but to also know where it came from and why.

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The 'This is GSC, like it or leave it.' attitude towards incoming members is a major inhibition towards the cultural spread of GSC. I understand that this is essentially a shaping tool to spread only the ideal parts of this newfound society, but the nazidom of views and narrow path we must follow to stay here is a major turn off. (understood that is my choice to follow)

Now I PRAY I wont be banned/suspended/warned for anything I have said, but I need to say one last thing.

I do intend to start a glowsticking club at the college I will be attending in the Fall, I wish to spread the culture as Dave has done here, yet if I am to spread the "correct" views, we should be taught them, not shunned for not knowing them.

College is a different story since people who are in college tend to be more open minded and are of age that they can actually go to raves and parties. I'd hope in the club your also going to teach about plur and the negatives of battling and yada yada yada. Cause by not teaching your letting ignorance spread.

Thats all we are doing here. We've seen the negative effects rear it's ugly head time and time again. So the "nazidom" as you put it comes from the fact that we don't wish to see these negative effects anymore. Gradually more and more people are realizing that competitions and battling and crews are silly and not needed. We aren't burning people in ovens though. We simply ban them from the site if they want to go do their own thing. Likes it's been stated before glowsticking isn't life or death. Dave pumps a lot of money into this site and doesn't ask for any of it back.He doesn't put tons of ads on the site that make it hard to view posts. All he wants is to see his vision , his dream come to fruition.

As far as me supporting it. I don't see any reason not to because everything this site pushes is exactly the same vibe and community you would have been greeted with at raves years back. Not 100% of people were all nice and full of PLUR but it was a way larger percentage than there is now. In NY people rep colors, crew names, they battle when it comes to candi stepping /walking..whatever the hell you wanna call it. That shit just did not exist when i started going to parties so it sucks to see it now. I see the negative effects those things actually had on the scene cause i was there before it. People don't meet and great like they used to.

and there are communities out there that have sites for pro battling with glowsticks. So the people we ban can just go there if they want. Are you gonna get a welcoming community there...hell no. Most posts denigrate into a fuck you contest. and your not gonna get anything constructive said about your video posts. So it's really up to the person.

As you see though we don't ban just because. People slowly earn it. Alot of times though we see it coming. I've been on the site for ages now and all the people who end up getting banned make the same sounding posts and try to defend their love of battling without actually having to say it, cause they know when they do they will be gone. But we know long b4 the person says it so it's rarely a shock. So we give them time before the "like it or leave it" happens. There's only so much we can really do and when it comes down to it I know IM NOT here to give help and support to those who want to battle and run around repping a crew name and all that sillyness.

"we should be taught them, not shunned..." Like i already said people get alot of chances MOST of the time. So we teach. we talk..we explain, but when the person doesnt agree in the end...what should we do then? Let them stay and just learn more from us to go pwn people...or maybe so they can stay and teach other people the wrong way to go about things? We arent gonna do that.

So nowI ask you. Where do your beliefs differ? Are you in agreement with woobzy that battling is a good way to learn?

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So now I ask you. Where do your beliefs differ? Are you in agreement with woobzy that battling is a good way to learn?

In economics class I am taught that a functioning economy is built upon the competition between suppliers, vendors, and consumers. This competition drives the market forward, conditioning it for expansion and ultimately growth. It is given that a culture is not an economy, and a society is not a market, yet they too have similar traits when it comes to growth and expansion.

I too can see how competitions between artists (or ravers essentially) can generate a reason for expansion and growth. The threat of loosing face, the opportunity for praise, the struggle for glory that these "battles" generate, inspires individuals to train beyond conventional limits. The sense of urgency to become better that results from "battling" is most definitely stronger then any urge to train based solely on PLUR beliefs or 'Training for the sake of learning'.

However, as much as I see competition an essential part of growth, the connotations and denotations derived from the term "To Battle" steer me away from them. I believe friendly (and maybe small amounts of unfriendly) competition will make some one a better stringer/freehander. But then the question arises; would you rather "be the best" and forsake the PLUR mantra to attain it, or be content with your knowledge and embrace PLUR?

Some people will pick either, and for me, I would have the latter. I personally believe living in PLUR is an immense lifetime feat to be undertaken, where as becoming the best, would just be a past time hobby.

But then again, the world is not black and white, nor is it right or wrong. People can still live PLUR and train through both mediums.

In short. Yes, I agree with Woobzy, battling is a good way to learn.

As for crews and representing colors, I believe that it is a natural human tendency to become part of a group. Take RG for example, she considers the GSC founding community to be a second family of sorts. Similarly, people will find others with similar intrests and they will stick together. Essentially they are just a group of friends, but when pride, ego and greed are introduced, they eventually become part of a group, or crew, or gang, or sect, or even regime in worst case scenarios...

I too would like to be part of a group, the difference is, I have found this group, before I found a street crew.

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one thing that has been emphasized though is that when it comes to glowsticking there is no such thing as the "best" glowsticker because what we strive for is not to be better than others but to achieve our own unique style that differentiates us from others. that is another reason i forgot to mention as to why we do not want battling associated with glowsticking.

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I can talk from experiencing it. How many parties have you been 2? How much of both mediums have you experienced in real life?

Why do we as a website have to support those that wish to battle as their way of practice?

Even the most "friendly" of battles in texas ended up with someone getting their tires slashed.

I have been to 4 raves before. I have been a raver for 5 months, and I have never seen a "battle", nor herd of one, nor even contemplated their existence until here. I have never experienced either medium as I have only begun to learn freehand for under a month now. I was unaware of the "battling" website nor the events that occurred in either NYC or Texas. (Other then the death of a child.) I have no friends that are ravers, nor do I have any contacts with people in the rave culture.

I do admit I am speculating on the effects of "battling" completely in theory and I also acknowledge that real data outweighs experimental design in any circumstance. However, I feel that anyone could have made the inferences I have, and the fact still stands. Competition is impossible to avoid, either it is incorporated in design and given strict guidelines, or it is suppressed in mainstream organization and will be exploited regardless in underground systems.

If battling is not the issue, it will be, who is the most unique, or the most fluid, or the most something...

Dude our community doesn't look towards who's the best and who's the worst... We are all here to share the common interest of glowsticking... You may think that battling is good to learn, but is it really? Usually, the new people here tends to think that battling helps motivate them to learn but in reality, it's just starts building their egos to battle and think of themselves as the best and all that bullshit... Besides that, how can we compare the different styles? It's not as if we all agree to favor is on style over the others... Besides that, we all like to learn at our own pace such as finding our own style (it's been over 2 years for me and I still don't have a strict style), our own flow (not even the most experience can find a flow to stick with, we are always experimenting), or our own uniqueness (nothing can be too unique)...

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Our community doesn't look towards who's the best and who's the worst... We are all here to share the common interest of glowsticking...

Thats understood, I wasn't claiming that this site does, only people tend to label each other without others consent or knowledge.

For example; If I asked you "Who is the best stringer?" and you gave me an honest answer, it is possible you could come up with one person that you feel has the most potential/knowledge/uniqueness or whatever it is that sets them apart when stringing.

Now that person may not have ever had a competition, so there is no way to prove this, but because that person was labeled the best someone, competition arises, and people will strive become better then that designated person.

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Sure you cant get rid of people having personal "favorites" but its not like they are worshiped and hardly anyone here has any kind of ego because of any attention they might get.

We dont like a lot of competition and are especially against battling because of what it does to the scene. We dont deny that battling can work too but its not the only working model.

If our model works great for us then why try and fix it?

Cleric already told you about the other groups who started competing and their scene generally went to hell. People actually got into real fights. To my knowledge we have Never had a fight or even anything close to it in our sites history.

We bring people together on this site. The battling communities push people apart by separating themselves into unneeded groups. If you think battling works better then look in our media center. Those people didnt get to that level by battling.

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Economics isn't glowsticking. Battling has nothing to do with sticking, they don't go together . . . at the very least it doesn't fly here.

No offense guy, but uhm . . .this argument is moot. Unless you've been around from the beginning and you've seen how the culture has developed and how negative battling has been over all in the community . . .you don't really get it. I understand. Time for you to trust the people that have been here before you. The reason why we as a community has stood the test of time is because we embody what PLUR is. Battling isn't very PLUR, the results of battling isn't very PLUR.

Everyone no matter if they know how to do one move or knows a thousand moves is valued equally. Respect is equally given, this is family . . . you're asking us to choose among fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters and everything in between . . we don't do that. If you really feel the way you do, you need to bow out.

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Even though I know you are stepping out of this debate, systemk, i just wanted to make one more point. It's not meant to patronize or anything like that.

Let's take the tangent that battling and competition are not synonymous for a moment. Competition implies a demand of some sort. I noticed you compared economics and glowsticking earlier. The thing is, glowsticking is not a competitive environment. There is a supply of glowstickers, and maybe there is even a demand, but we're not competing for anything. The people here are more like family. Competition also denotes that someone is trying to get ahead and be better than someone else. That's just not what we do. This isn't school with grades on a curve. This isn't the free market system with goods and services to be sold. This is an artform and here we're like a family and we really all guard each others' interests. Competition is a moot point.

To move away from my first point, competition/battling is not needed or even wanted as a means of improvement. We can inspire each other in the art without it being a competition. We want to be better because we admire each other, which engenders a much greater sense of community.

Anyway, you seem to get the point so i won't belabour this any longer.

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everyone really needs to read the beliefs and ideals of this site that have built up a strong community over the years...PLUR is not part of battling and competition because like cleric said battle is competition and no matter which one ur doin ur tryin to win...everyone is always entitiled to their opinions but if there opinions conflict with the community then you either have to understand and follow or this community just isnt for u...SystemiK i hope u start to understand...

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In macroeconomics class, you learn that a functioning global economy is based on the principle of comparative advantage and trade. there is no such thing as an absolute advantage. but honestly, why bother giving such an example? glowsticking is not a market.

as a libertarian capitalist, i am all for a market economy and rationalism and objectivism, but honestly, glowsticking is not at all like that.

YOU may see competition as essential to YOUR growth.

But what you lack is experience and the wisdom from witnessing history of the past 8 years.

Everyone on here who has survived the inevitable doldrums and plateaus aren't battlers and competers when it comes to glowsticking. All the videos from the people you LEARN from... people who are extremely experienced and pushed the art.. they didn't do it to beat other people. When you are really that good and have that much experience, you don't do it for competition. You do it for yourself. The people who do it for the competition have all quit. They might even have been the "best" in their own subjective criteria for a short period of time. and that is what led to their demise as glowstickers.

Honestly, you haven't seen what competitions do to scenes. "Friendly" Competitions lead to a need for comparison, and that leads to a merging of styles that makes it easier to judge. The figure skating analogy is a good one.

If one of the goals of figure skating is to make it look easy, no one succeeds. To win the gold, you have to abandon any pretense of "effortless movement," and use the fanciest moves you can to scare up points. Never mind that it makes you look like a bungling oaf.

You can't blame the skaters for this—they're just trying to win. It's the scoring system that sets us up for the fall.

In Texas, Hawaii in the past, and other places, competing has inevitably lead to a merging of styles that favor a particular style of glowsticking rather than others. Usually this translates practically into less smoothness and more into things that tend to have a "wow" factor". this has stunted glowsticking overall and people tend to get too worked up about learning simple but crowd pleasing moves instead of the very difficult but subtle moves.

You may notice I don't make a differentiation between "friendly" and "negative" competitions.

That's because ideally, there could be a difference, but in practical reality, there is no difference.

The reason is because you can't control the thoughts of other people, some of whom you may not be even interacting with. A hot loud atmosphere of a rave is the worst case scenario for misunderstanding.

Even when it's a quiet place like a college campus, your need for competition will be apparent, and that will set the tone. Instead of videos being produced for people like you, videos will only be released after someone wins a competition. Forget the friendly vibe on somewhere like Glowsticking.com.

You seem like a smart guy, and I'm going to make the assumption you figured what you think you know after what seemed like to you careful analysis, but I'm going to also add you have relatively little practical experience, and also that you aren't the first one to make the exact same arguments.

The economics argument has been used before, some by econ majors.

The "freedom to do as you please" argument has been used-- although that tends to favor glowsticking.com banning those people "as we please"

I'm going to go ahead and type the same thing I've been typing in response to the exact same arguments as I did consistently the past many years.

You are right, the world isn't black or white. But glowsticking.com is reaching for an ideal, the orange glow of ultras, not a shade of gray. Once you glowstick for a period of time, and by period of time, i mean years and years, not months, you'll understand.

You can learn however you please, but I'm not going to help you if you are a competitor. If you are a competitor, and lets assume that I am very competitive. Why should I help you someday become better than me? How do I know you are a friendly competitor and you won't use what I teach you (in the terms of server bandwidth, the money I put into promotions, the videos, the TIME that everyone donates to produce these videos) in the future to create your own glowsticking club at school and you'll teach them competitions are okay. So why should I let you on glowsticking.com, given your arguments. Why should I let you use GSC's resources when you don't follow the rules?

You are a smart guy, but you lack street smarts. If you can't see the difference in glowsticking.com, a public web site, with an open registration system, and a dance crew, with closed membership, than you need to get out more and go to more parties and dance in circles until one of these crews battles you. Then you'll understand what competition is. I mean those dance crews will smile at you, and they'll even give you a handshake. They'll smile at you because their goal is competition, and they might even call it friendly competition. but watch how fast they leave the circle if you happen to be... as you might say.. "better" in their eyes.

Glowsticking.com members are not a crew. They will take their time to teach. Because they don't do it for the competetive aspect, which is ultimately a selfish reason. They do it because of the intrinsic beauty in the overall community of glowsticking, and they understand that in art, it's always best to have an open community of artists.

The best paintings, photos, statues, novels were NOT produced because of competitions. Sure, Leonardo and Michelangelo hated each other. but one did paintings and the other did statues.

Name ONE major art work that was produced from a competition. Right... there is none.

The most famous artwork, the Mona Lisa, was thought of as trash for the longest time.

Competitions naturally require a point of comparison. if the system of judging art is so horridly flawed, then how can you really know anything?

It seems to me that everyone will have a different opinion. Some freehanders main goal will be consistancy, while others will be creativity, while others will be smoothness. how can you compete against someone whose values are different? You cannot.

but your attitude will seriously be annoying to those others.

For example; If I asked you "Who is the best stringer?" and you gave me an honest answer, it is possible you could come up with one person that you feel has the most potential/knowledge/uniqueness or whatever it is that sets them apart when stringing.

Now that person may not have ever had a competition, so there is no way to prove this, but because that person was labeled the best someone, competition arises, and people will strive become better then that designated person.

nobody can control their feelings. but you can control your outward reactions. that is what human is about. people want to steal, lie, and kill, but it's our society and community that enforces rules against it.

glowsticking.com cannot control people's inner feelings, but we have set up a system of etiquette that disallows competitions. if anything, at least we are controlling our baser instincts. I don't ram my car into pedestrians when i am pissed off because I understand that there are consequences.

glowsticking.com over the years has built a VERY strong incentive for people not to battle. we have the largest group of the oldest and as you would say, the "best" glowstickers. and we all have built up a system of enforcement of our ideals. if you want to learn from us, (the videos are pretty good, but you aren't going to ever go past the video stage unless you join the community in both action AND spirit), then you will have to be like us. you are right.. there is no other place comparable.

using your economics argument, although it doesn't fit at all, and I'm being humorous here, glowsticking.com was the first to market, with a strong anti-competetive monopolistic and we have built up a quite a large barrier to entry for other web sites, such that we pretty much get to define the rules.

is it unfair seeming? perhaps. but we spent the last many years, typing millions of posts, with hard work, tears, and a lot of drama, building up this culture.

you can choose to be proud and not accept it, in which case, you'll be asked to leave, or you can sit back and choose to LEARN.

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I think Young Gscers are cool. There are some that want to show off at school, but those kids disappear quick. I would say 'young gscer' but I dont see too many in person, and dont talk to that many people online, so Il just use glowstickers.The other young glowstickers in general seem to bring about new ideas as well, because their closer to thier more creative part of life. They will start new ideas and cont to carry on the belief in the long run.

About battling, the off topic-topic, I disagree in it. It discourages glowstickers to get better if they get 'showed up' too much. The younger glowstickers get discouraged easier if you want to relate it to the topic. Knowing that we are all different in some way, I feel if anyone copies what im doing, they will change it in their own creative way. Or It will give me a reason to change it, kinda like passing things down, like we do with everything family oreinted. It makes life easier and move quicker. Battling blocks that passing-down of moves or combos. This is just my personal belief about the ideas.

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Competition is essential for expansion as it stimulates growth, without pride and ego. (hence the economic structure reference)

Competition is essential to ECONOMIC expansion. and economists wouldn't even say competition. but rather specialization of skillsets that have the same affect as competition. and even then, it's not necessarily the best produced product that wins. DEMAND has no value attached to it. so DEMAND doesn't necessarily mean the slickest, best, most technological or skilled or efficient production. It's just demand. without a value criteria attached.

Competition demands winning, and keeping score means you have a vested interest in the competing aspect of it as opposed to the artistic aspect of it.

The best artists aren't competitors. the best ATHLETES are.

competition implies winning and losing. people take losing differently. it especially hurts when you weren't even competing, but the other person insists on it being a competition. it also hurts when you are trying to win and you lose.

"friendly competition" in terms of dancing is seriously the dumbest oxymoron ever invented.

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I have never once said "I like to Battle." Nor have I ever said that "battling" is the only way to learn.

My primary argument was stating that the censorship found on this website is an inhibition to the cultural spread that this site strives to achieve.

My secondary argument that arouse from Clerics observations and rebuttals was that competition will occur despite the censorship and that maybe the methods used at GSC are ineffectual at either slowing the progress or shutting down the "battle" scene.

The tertiary argument was that "battling" is a type of competition, yet the reciprocal does not hold true, and that I believe competition can be educational and constructive.

All three arguments were satisfied through the previous posts and I understand why you (The GSC Site) chooses each method. Your post Dave, however, seems to be a direct attack on me.

"YOU may see competition as essential to YOUR growth." I did not claim this, and I do not believe it holds true for any person at all. I was simply stating that competition is a steroid for growth, and that this web pages' key purpose is just that, growth. Now I understand that that is the wrong growth you are looking for, and that you want the most idealistic parts (presumably culture and PLUR) to grow without side effects that steroids incite. I get it.

You can learn however you please, but I'm not going to help you if you are a competitor. If you are a competitor, and lets assume that I am very competitive. Why should I help you someday become better than me? How do I know you are a friendly competitor and you won't use what I teach you (in the terms of server bandwidth, the money I put into promotions, the videos, the TIME that everyone donates to produce these videos) in the future to create your own glowsticking club at school and you'll teach them competitions are okay. So why should I let you on glowsticking.com, given your arguments. Why should I let you use GSC's resources when you don't follow the rules?

Well, I wouldn't expect you to help a competitor, that would be hypocritical and possibly hazardous to the wellbeing of the site, especially if its one that argues with you, but I am not one, I do not compete, I am not competitive, (I may be head strong and argumentative) and I do not "battle".

but your attitude will seriously be annoying to those others. I figured that already. I have resigned from that argument, now I am defending my privilege to be here.

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Arguing for the purpose of enjoyment of arguing is almost trolling and is NOT conducive to the vibe that the GSC community strives for. Is there a place for argument? Yes. But we don't want the entire site to be an arguing forum. The points have been made by systemik and other members, several times, and it's just getting ridiculous. I mean, we aren't even arguing about anything. The people defending GSC ideals are talking about ideology, whereas Systemik is talking simply about personal growth. We really don't care about HOW people learn to glowstick as long as it's NOT through battling or competitions or any of those things we don't approve of here. Even then, if someone honestly regrets their initial influences, they can still be accepted.

Can competition spur growth? Yes, just as much as watching a really cool video that inspires you. Do we want competitions? No, you, Systmik, say you don't either, so stop arguing for them.

End of subject.

Please, let's stop.

PS sorry if this was repetitive, malformed, or "greater-than-thou" I'm running off of a long day after a 20 hour day and only 5 hours of sleep between the two.